Voyager of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  “You say nonsense. We animals are not,” a second voice said. “Why are you here? We know no one with Tremontanan servants.”

  “We’re not servants,” Zara said. “King Jeffrey sent us. He needs to communicate with you.”

  “Who?” The man sounded genuinely puzzled, and Zara closed her eyes and silently cursed. They’d come to the wrong place.

  “King Jeffrey of Tremontane,” Ransom said. “You’re agents of the Crown, we know you are.”

  Both men laughed. “We Karitian,” the first said. “You are wrong. We will call the nakati to take you where you not a threat.”

  Zara went back over everything she’d been told. Two deep cover agents, code named Bull and Lion. The house with the purple curtains and long scratches on the door. Now, if she were an agent of the Crown in an enemy city, her life in danger if her identity was revealed, and two strangers came knocking on the door, what would she do?

  “I can prove we are who we say we are,” she said. “There’s a Device in my pocket. Take a look. It’s for the King to communicate with you.” She rocked until she was lying on her side with her hip in the air, revealing the hidden pocket. Someone knelt beside her and reached inside her pocket with one hand. With his other hand, he squeezed her bottom briefly and chuckled. Zara didn’t react. That was no doubt what he wanted.

  The man stood and crossed the room, his sandals making the wooden floor creak. “This Tremontanan is Device,” he said. There was silence. Zara heard Ransom breathing heavily nearby and hoped it didn’t mean he was hurt. Not that that mattered to him.

  Sandals came back toward her, and then the man knelt beside her again, grabbed her shoulder and wrenched her upright. “Name the Tremontanan ambassador,” he said. His Tremontanese was suddenly fluent, his accent that of the northwest.

  “Calliope Blackwood,” she replied.

  “And her secretary?”

  “James. I never heard his surname.”

  “What color are his eyes?”

  “Blue.”

  “Who is agent 10254?”

  “I don’t know. I’m not an agent, just the woman on the spot. But Blackwood gave me a pass phrase for you she said would prove we’re who we say we are. She said to tell you, ‘Loosen your belts.’”

  The man was silent again. Then he released her, making her lose her balance and fall to the floor. “Of course you’re not an agent. No agent would have done anything so ham-fisted as you just did. Didn’t it occur to you we might be watched?”

  “I thought we were being careful. Would you untie us now?”

  “I’m still not sure,” the other man said. “This could be a trick. She could have been primed with those answers and the pass phrase. Not that I’m saying it means anything.”

  “You don’t believe that, or you wouldn’t be speaking so freely,” Zara said. “And you’ve already proved you’re Tremontanan.”

  “You think you’re smart enough to work that out on your own?”

  “I think no Karitian man would have touched me the way you did a minute ago.”

  “Rowena,” Ransom said, his voice low.

  “Now, untie us and we can talk like civilized people. Another thing the Karitians aren’t.”

  The room was silent again. “We’ll untie you,” the first man said, “but you’ll leave the bags on unless you want us to dispose of you permanently. We can’t afford to compromise our identities and I’m still not completely convinced you are who you say you are.”

  The ropes around her wrists loosened, and she freed herself, then sat cross-legged as calmly as if her heart weren’t beating far too fast. “Use the Device, and that will prove it,” she said, rubbing her wrists. Beside her, she heard Ransom moving around, and then his hand briefly touched her thigh and withdrew. She had no idea what he meant to convey, but it eased her mind to have him nearby.

  “We don’t know how,” the second man said. “And we’re not about to trust your word.”

  Surely this level of paranoia was unwarranted. It was starting to annoy her. “The Device will let you communicate by voice with anyone who has the same Device, anywhere in the world,” she said. “It’s better than a telecoder because it can’t be intercepted. I’ll tell you how to work it, and you’ll speak to the King himself. I hope you’ll trust his word more than mine.”

  “Talk,” the second man said. “We’ll see.”

  Zara ran through the instructions Blackwood had given her and heard the tiny distant tick-thud of the Device’s innards engaging. One of the men drew in a sharp breath; the Device had probably started glowing. “You might want to go into another room, if there is one,” Zara said. “I don’t think we should hear whatever instructions the King gives you. Is that sufficiently paranoid for you?”

  “Shut up,” the first man said, but without malice. Footsteps crossed the room, and a door opened and swung shut. Zara let out a deep breath. Maybe this would work after all.

  They waited for a while. The door opened. “Come here,” the first man said, and more footsteps receded across the room. The door shut again.

  “Did he hurt you?” Ransom said.

  “Of course not. He squeezed my bottom. It’s not worth worrying about.”

  “Forgive me if I worry about what those two men might do to you if I weren’t here.”

  “I don’t think they see either of us as a threat. A physical threat, I mean. Obviously they see us as a threat to their safety from the Karitian government.”

  “I hope they believe the King is who he claims to be. I have no doubt those men would kill us to protect their secret.”

  “I agree. But I think they’re coming to accept what we have to say.”

  Ransom let out a deep sigh. “Have I said lately that this is insane and you are a lunatic?”

  “Not in so many words.”

  “Well, this is insane. And you’re a lunatic.”

  “A lunatic who got you out of prison.”

  “Thank you for that. I’m not sure I said it earlier.”

  “I had to make sure it wasn’t goodbye.”

  Ransom chuckled, a dry sound thanks to the bag. “You’re remarkable.”

  The warmth of his voice made her blush. She was too old to be so easily moved, and yet… “I’ve just lived a long life.”

  “And that’s not remarkable? I want to know everything about you. Who you’ve been. What you’ve seen.”

  “I want to know why the name Daniel is so offensive to you. It seems perfectly nice to me. Not as nice as Ransom.”

  “So you know that too, eh? Daniel. Rhymes with ‘spaniel’. Which is what the other children called me until the day I went to medical school and left it behind. It’s an unpleasant reminder of my childhood.”

  “I’m sorry I asked. I promise I’ll never call you that.”

  “Now I wish I knew your real name. Turnabout and all that.”

  He’d moved close enough his thigh was pressed against hers. “What makes you think it’s not Rowena?”

  “I think you’ve probably used a dozen names in your lifetime. I’d like to know the original.”

  “I…ask me later. When this is over,” she said, and immediately regretted her words. She absolutely could not tell him who she was. That was a secret that could bring down a kingdom. You trust him, she thought, and brushed it away. Trust had nothing to do with it.

  “I’m starting to become impatient with these fellows. Surely the King can’t have that much to say—”

  The door opened. “Take the Device and go back to Goudge’s Folly,” the first man said. “And forget about this place. We have to move now you’ve found us.”

  “We’re sorry,” Zara began.

  “It’s standard procedure. Go. You can remove the bags once you’re out our back door. We don’t need you seeing us, just in case.”

  Zara stood. The man took hold of her shoulders. “Straight ahead,” he said, then slapped the Device into her palm. She pocketed it and fumbled her way to the door. Beside
her, Ransom stumbled and cursed quietly. Then the door opened, and she felt warm air, and then she was on the shady verandah and the door closed behind her. She quickly removed the bag and combed through her disordered hair. Ransom was doing the same. He dropped his bag and grinned at her.

  “I guess we convinced them,” he said. “Now, back to the docks. Do we have a ride?”

  “I hope so. She said she’d come back every hour. We might need to hire transportation if they won’t let us linger on the docks, especially if we still look like servants.”

  “You could change back into your finery.”

  “That would take too long. Let’s just go.” She closed her eyes and remembered what it had felt like to be one of those downtrodden Tremontanan servants, but that made her angry, so she slumped her shoulders and bowed her head and went around the corner of the verandah. She was certain the agents were watching them go, making sure they did go, and it annoyed her even as she reminded herself they probably were justified in taking so many precautions.

  There were a few Karitians in the street as they reached the stairs. Zara ignored them. She was a servant, nothing worth noticing, and it would take less than an hour to reach the docks—

  Someone shouted something in Karitian that sounded like a command. Ransom grabbed Zara’s arm. “He wants to know what we’re doing here,” he said in a low voice.

  “Tell him we’re…running an errand?”

  Behind them, the door to the agents’ house opened. Zara turned to see a Karitian man, or someone who looked Karitian, standing in the doorway. He shot a fierce, furious glare at her, then began yelling something in Karitian. Ransom’s grip grew tighter. “He’s accusing us of theft,” he said. “Run. Now.”

  Zara took off down the street, Ransom just behind her. Her thin sandals struck the pavers with harsh thuds that sent sharp streaks of pain up her shins with every running step. She wasn’t sure where she was going, wasn’t sure she was retracing their route exactly, but she could tell she was going north, toward the docks, and that way lay safety. “Why did he do that?” Ransom panted.

  “We drew attention,” Zara said. “Paranoid—if someone drew—the wrong conclusion about us—could mean someone might—ask the wrong questions.”

  “So they threw us to the wolves.”

  “Yes.” It was too hard to talk and run at the same time. Zara concentrated on running. She heard the crowd before turning a corner and running into it, people laughing and talking as if the silence of the morning had been a mistake. None of them made room for Zara the way they had earlier, though none of them looked at her either. She ran into someone, apologized, and turned around. Ransom was gone.

  She stood, craning her neck, looking for some glimpse of him and trying not to panic. He was there somewhere, he was blond, for heaven’s sake, he ought to be obvious among all these dark-haired Karitians, but the crowd might as well have been a caiman for how thoroughly it had swallowed him up. She took a calming breath. He was probably looking for her and she should stay where she was…unless he’d decided she was looking for him and was staying put.

  People were starting to look at her, and one or two of them looked like they wanted to know why she was there. He knows to go to the docks, she thought, we’ll meet there, and she pushed her way through the crowd and took off running again. North, to the docks, then back to Goudge’s Folly. Simple. Nothing to it.

  She got lost.

  It was the identical houses that did it. At first, she thought it was just that all the neighborhoods looked alike. Then she realized she’d passed the same dark stain on the wall twice. She stopped running, bent over and pressed her hand to her side. She needed to go slowly and pay closer attention to where she was. Go north.

  After about half an hour of fruitless wandering, the sun was beginning to set and she was becoming nervous. If only she could find the river! It was enormous, and she couldn’t imagine how she hadn’t stumbled on it before now. The streets were deserted, with everyone no doubt safely inside their identical houses. It left her once again feeling she was in a city populated by the dead, though why the dead would need the light that shone from most of the windows, she had no idea.

  She was starving and light-headed and tired of the pain in her feet her healing magic couldn’t relieve quickly enough. The nakati almost certainly patrolled the streets at night—it seemed like a Karitian thing to do, keep the undesirables off the street—and eventually one of them would find her, and then…prison, probably, where she’d be for a very long time. What would the Karitians do when they found out she wasn’t aging, wasn’t staying injured? She couldn’t conceal it the way Ransom had.

  And Ransom. What would he do when she simply disappeared? What could any of them do? They’d probably guess where she was, but with the prisoners never identified by name, the chances of them finding her were small. Her best hope was to be allowed to work off her debt, then she would slip away, go to the harbor and coerce someone into taking her to Goudge’s Folly, maybe steal a boat—

  She stopped in the middle of the narrow alley she’d been following and closed her eyes, then cursed. She was thinking like she was already captured. Well, Zara North didn’t give up. She followed through until hope truly was lost, and that had never yet happened to her. She would find the main street, and then the docks, and she would return to Goudge’s Folly, and then she would leave this stinking country and never return.

  She turned right onto a wider street and saw a Karitian woman coming toward her, filmy gauze over-robe covering her head. “Please,” Zara said, “can you help me? I’m lost.”

  The woman sneered at her and said something in Karitian. Zara repeated herself in Eskandelic and then in Veriboldan, but the woman just shook her head and continued on, giving Zara a wide berth as if she were contagious. Zara stopped, closed her eyes, and swallowed a scream of frustration. What she needed was a Tremontanan servant. She started walking. She was never coming back to Manachen again.

  The street widened, turning into a row of short buildings that looked more like shops than houses, with their iron-banded doors and barred windows. Zara walked more quickly. Those shop owners expected thieves, which made this the kind of neighborhood she didn’t want to loiter in. All the windows were dark; no help from that quarter.

  She heard footsteps approaching. A group, maybe four or five. Nakati, probably, traveling in a pack. She slipped between two of the shops and crouched low in the shadows. The steps drew closer. Whoever they were, they weren’t talking, and it sounded like they were wearing boots. Zara flattened herself against the wall and ducked her head to conceal her eyes. She hadn’t seen any Karitians wearing boots all day; they wore sandals, usually nicer than her thin-soled ones, or went barefoot. Even the nakati didn’t wear anything sturdier than sandals that laced up their shins.

  The footsteps slowed as they drew closer. “Around the corner,” someone said in Eskandelic, then the footsteps were running, they were almost on top of her, and she burst from her hiding place and ran in the opposite direction. Whoever they were, they were looking for her.

  She took turns at random, doubled back once or twice, listening for the sound of boots hammering the pavers behind her. Manachen was a maze, and she was lost in it, and someone was hunting her. Part of her brain was screaming at her to stop panicking, but dread of being caught had taken her over. Finally, when she couldn’t hear the boots anymore, she dropped to her knees and crawled under a verandah, and lay there, breathing heavily. Why would anyone be searching for her? Let alone an Eskandelic—

  She heard boots again, rapidly coming in her direction, just as it came to her. There was only one Eskandelic who would be looking for her. She curled into a tiny ball, praying they’d move on past. She was invisible in here, there was no way they could see her. The booted footsteps grew louder and closer.

  Zara held her breath until she saw spots, then let it out slowly, silently. She could see them now, from the knees down, four or five Karitian robes that
were dull in the light of the setting sun, four or five pairs of booted feet showing below the hems of the robes. They were coming toward her as surely as if she wasn’t hiding. How can they possibly know? she thought. They can’t track the Device so accurately! She held as still as she could.

  The boots stopped next to the steps of the verandah, and everything was still, so silent Zara wanted to scream just to hear something other than the blood pounding in her ears.

  One of the figures knelt and looked under the verandah. She held a pistol pointed directly at Zara’s head. “Come out, or I shoot,” Ghazarian said.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Zara considered letting the woman shoot her. It would hurt, and depending on where Ghazarian shot her, it might take a while for her to recover, but it would spare her whatever torture the pirate captain had in mind. On the other hand, Ghazarian might not shoot to kill, and if she did kill her, she’d probably search her body and find the Device. Zara crawled out from under the verandah. Hands grabbed her, pulled her to her feet and immobilized her. She didn’t bother struggling.

  Ghazarian thrust the pistol into her waistband and took two steps, which put her inches from Zara’s face. She was a little taller than Zara and about the same age, at least as old as Zara appeared. She smiled. “You see I have found you,” she said. “Take her.”

  “How did—ah!” One of the pirates wrenched her arm painfully behind her back and gave her a shove. “How did you find me?”

  “Walk,” Ghazarian said. “Not talk.”

  The pirate steered Zara through the streets, apparently counting off intersections the way she had earlier. Zara still didn’t fight back. There was no point, when they had her outnumbered, and she needed time to make a plan. They had some way of tracking her, so running away was pointless even if she could get free. She needed more information.

  They turned down one of the narrow, stinking alleys no wider than her outstretched arms and walked past a row of houses with one door and one window each until they came to a house whose window was dark. One of the pirates kicked the door in, and Zara’s captor shoved her inside. It looked the same as her and Ransom’s bolt hole, though without a blanket on the lumpy bed. This is taking mass production to an unhealthy level.